Apr. 25, 2013

Written by

Detroit Free Press Staff Writer

A federal appeals court today gave a boost to Kwame Kilpatrick in upholding a lower court’s decision that there was no evidence that the former Detroit mayor or other city officials sabotaged the murder investigation of slain exotic dancer Tamara Greene.

In an 18-page opinion, a three-member panel with the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that U.S. District Judge Gerald Rosen got it right when he tossed the case filed by Greene’s family, which argued for years that there was a cover-up by Kilpatrick in the killing of Greene, who was said to have danced at a rumored but never proven wild party at the mayoral Manoogian Mansion.

In his 2011 ruling, Rosen wrote: “There is no evidentiary basis upon which a trier of fact could conclude that Defendant Kilpatrick participated, whether directly or through his approval of the actions of others, in any obstruction of or interference with the (Detroit Police Department) investigation into Ms. Greene’s murder.”

The 6th Circuit panel agreed.

“The district court did not err in granting summary judgment in favor of Kilpatrick and the city of Detroit,” the federal appeals court wrote in its opinion.

Norman Yatooma, who represented the Greene family and was seeking $150 million in the lawsuit, was not readily available for comment.

Kilpatrick is behind bars awaiting sentencing on public corruption charges after a federal jury convicted him in March of racketeering, extortion, bribery and fraud. He faces up to 20 years in prison.

Kilpatrick has long argued that there never was a party at the Manoogian Mansion, and that he never did anything to interfere with the Greene murder investigation.

Greene, 27, who danced under the name Strawberry, was killed in a drive-by shooting in Detroit in April 2003, about eight months after supposedly dancing at the bash and being assaulted by Carlita Kilpatrick, the ex-mayor’s wife.

Her family sued the city and the mayor in 2005, saying officials sabotaged her murder investigation to prevent her killers from being found.

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Lawyers for the city and Kilpatrick denied the charges and fought for its dismissal.

“After literally years of litigation there was not one witness who came forward to say that Kwame Kilpatrick or the city of Detroit hindered or obstructed in the homicide investigation of Tamara Greene,” Kilpatrick’s lawyer James Thomas told the Free Press in 2011. “Although it was rumored that there were 150 people at the house and 50 dancers, not one neighbor, not one witness ... came forward to say they saw a party. It tested credibility to its furthest extreme.”

Yatooma had two witnesses who claimed to have attended the party, but the defense argued those individuals had credibility issues.

At the heart of the Greene family’s claim was that Kilpatrick and city officials were part of a plot to impede the Greene murder investigation and prevent the real killer or killers from being caught and sued. Kilpatrick in particular, the plaintiffs argued, was trying to keep the public from finding out about the party, where his wife was rumored to have assaulted Greene.

But in his ruling, Rosen concluded the plaintiffs lacked proof on several fronts:

■There was no proof that Kilpatrick acted on a motive to interfere with the investigation, even if he had a motive.

■There is no proof that Kilpatrick ordered anyone to destroy any evidence in the Greene case, or, that he had the Greene case transferred to various investigators.

■Just because Kilpatrick fired Deputy Chief Gary Brown, who was questioning the Manoogian party rumor, that didn’t mean that that was part of a bigger plot to hinder the Greene investigation.

Greene’s family now has the option of asking for a full review by the entire 6th Circuit panel, which would then have to decide whether to take up the case.